Hello all,
Going into college I was torn between pursuing a clinical psychology phd and med school. I went with pre-med courses and ended up doing terribly in Bio and Gen Chem despite putting in a lot of effort which took away from my other gen ends as well. I ended freshman year with a 2.8, but with A’s in both intro to psych and neuroscience. I’m deciding to switch my course to psychology; however with such a sub par GPA that will be difficult to bring up, does this eliminate me from psych graduate programs? Would they consider that the classes I did poorly in have nothing to do with psychology or would they just see it as a reflection of an incompetent student? I’m nervous that I really screwed up here.
I wouldn’t worry too much. Both graduate schools and future employers will consider why an applicant has a few rough grades if one has a good explanation. Your explanation seems good to me. Besides, I think that grad schools, more than anything, are looking for applicants who can successfully complete their programs. You evidence that in your psychology grades, research experience, GRE scores, letters of recommendation, what you bring to the interview, etc. As long as your overall GPA improves, I think it won’t be a huge issue. That being said, I would work on getting it up above a 3.0. Ideally, aim for a 3.5. It should be doable if you play to your strengths and wrack up more psychology courses, in which you seem to be performing very well.
However, if the low grades in Bio and Gen Chem still bother you, you can always retake the courses (over the summer or during the academic year) and get them replaced on your transcript. This would take them out of your overall GPA.
To the last line of your post–I wouldn’t worry that you really messed up. It’s freshman year. You have time to recuperate and build an application that can shine.
Best to you!
^I agree with the above. Low grades in freshman year before switching majors is understandable, and common, and you can still get into some good PhD programs with that background as long as you do well from here on out. I do agree that you should aim for at least a 3.5; you can do it, as the low grades in one or two classes become less central to your GPA as you do better.
Make sure that you get some research experience - if you know that you want to get a PhD in psychology, start in the fall when you come back to college! Do also note that many clinical psychology PhD hopefuls spend 2-3 years after college working in research as a research coordinator or research associate - clinical psych is so competitive these days that that’s often a tacit requirement of the best programs.